A mega-storm envelops Saturn eight months

Imagine being involved in a storm as big as the Earth with lightning 10,000 times more powerful than normal, flashing 10 times per secondo.Ora imagine that this storm is still going on for eight monthsOne of the most violent weather events in the solar system and 'Saturn began last December and is still being said on Wednesday the British journal Nature.Two studies draw on the observations of amateur and professional astronomers with a wide range of tools including NASA's Cassini.Saturn, like Jupiter, is no stranger to convective storms, 'cause both gas giants.The difference, however, is that the mega-storms on Jupiter tend to burst suddenly, as the lord of the rings gives birth to a monster almost periodically.It occurs on average once every year, and seems to be linked to the summer solstice, when the planet's orbit brings it a little 'closer to the sun and its atmosphere will heat up more' giving rise to these disturbances. .The event is known as the "Great White Spot" because of the mass of storm clouds that glow white in the upper atmosphere and burst.The show is so great that it can be seen with telescopes from Earth. Five were seen in the last 130 years. The last occurred in 1990.But the current great white spot is proving to be a dazzling spectacle unprecedented.The event 'began at 2105 GMT on 5 December, when the ground-based telescopes have detected a "barely visible white spot" on a part normally spotless and foggy northern hemisphere of Saturn, about 35 degrees north latitude.Within a few weeks, and the storm 'covering a larger area of ​​about 10,000 kilometers (6,000 miles) across, more or less comparable with the diameter of the Earth, and two months later the clouds had almost surrounded the entire planet.Astronomers are particularly intrigued by the current of the Great White Spot.The history of observation of this phenomenon and 'a po'lacunosa. But the evidence suggests that currently is exceptionally intense and a bit 'premature, because it was still spring, when the storm on Saturn and' originated.Source: http://news.yahoo.com/tempest-hell-seen-saturn-190517740.html